Beer in Berlin has improved immeasurably over the last decade, with the recent appearance of a slew of cool bars like the Muted Horn and Foersters Feine Biere. Among the German capital’s best new beer-related developments is a resurgence of its traditional style, Berliner Weisse, which got pretty close to extinction, at least in its most authentic form, by 2010 or so. The driving force behind its recent renaissance? Ulrike Genz, who founded the charmingly named Schneeeule Brauerei (or “Snowy Owl Brewery”) in 2016.
“With Schneeeule, I’m trying to recreate real Berliner Weisse,” Genz says. For Genz—and the brewing scientists and historians at Berlin’s VLB brewing institute and the brewing department at the Technische Universität Berlin, where she studied—that means a Wheat Beer, brewed in Berlin, that is bottle-refermented with local Brettanomyces. (Heads up, Florida.) Over the past four years, Genz’s charismatic, Brett-inflected Berliners have turned heads, in both their classic (the textbook Marlene) and innovative (Kennedy, made with Sorachi Ace hops) expressions.
Helping to save a native beer is heroic enough. But in the second half of 2020, Genz also opened her own cool bar, the Schneeeule Salon für Berliner Bierkultur—yes, a “salon for Berlin beer culture”—in the city’s eternally up-and-coming Wedding district.
It’s a tough year to open a new business, let alone one dedicated to a distinctly local culture. But for Genz, it’s the right thing to do.
“In the Salon, I can present my beer exactly the way I like it. The way it should be,” she says. “Properly poured in proper glassware and overall proper conditions. Also, I can present beers I do not sell in my webshop or to resellers.” Those include aged bottles, experiments, and limited releases, as well as Berliner Weisse cocktails and shots of quality schnapps.
“If you want to have a proper Berliner Weisse experience while you are in Berlin, Schneeeule Salon is the place to be,” Genz says.
As soon as we can travel again, you know where to go.
Words,Evan Rail